Northwestern University Athletics
Northwestern
Chicago State
Baseball Downs Chicago State, 5-3
4/24/2001 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
April 24, 2001
EVANSTON, Ill. - The Northwestern baseball team entertained the Chicago State Cougars at Rocky Miller Park for a mid-week contest and came away with a 5-3 victory. The win upped the Wildcats' record to 18-24 on the season.
Sophomore Christopher Spiering (Schaumburg, Ill./Conant) earned his first start of the season and threw seven complete innings, giving up two runs on seven hits and striking out two. Junior Andy Adams (Mt. Prospect, Ill./Prospect) and freshman Dan Konecny (Ripon, Wis./Ripon) each threw an inning to end the game. Adams gave up one hit and struck out one while Konecny gave up one run on one hit. He walked one and struck out one in the ninth.
The Cougars got on the board first, plating two runs in the top of the fifth. Michael Smolka singled home the first run, and then leadoff hitter Jerrold Brock executed a suicide squeeze perfectly to make the score 2-0.
In the Wildcat half of the fifth, shortstop Josh Lieberman (Mundelein, Ill./ Mundelein) earned a two-out walk and came around to score on an Eric Roeder (Onsted, Mich./Onsted) single to center. Roeder leads the team with 30 RBI.
In the sixth inning, Northwestern scored twice to take a 3-2 lead. Rightfielder David Gresky (North Royalton, Ohio/St. Ignatius) led things off with a one-out single to center, then came around to score on two Cougar miscues that left Jason Krynski at second base. Catcher Joe Hietpas (Appleton, Wis./North) had a single, advancing Krynski to third, and then Travis Tharp hit a sacrifice fly to score Krynski.
With a one-run lead, the Wildcats plated runs in the seventh and eighth innings to put them ahead 5-2. In the seventh, Roeder walked and stole second. He advanced to third on a balk by the Chicago State pitcher and scored on a Gresky sacrifice fly to center. In the eighth inning, Hietpas tripled to the right field corner and scored on Tharp's second sacrifice fly of the game.
The Cougars scored one run in the top of the ninth when John Jensen doubled to right field and advanced to third on a Konecny wild pitch. Jarrod Bordi grounded out to shortstop, scoring Jensen from third.
The `Cats are next in action when they host the Iowa Hawkeyes at Rocky Miller Park in a four-game conference series. Game 1 is schedule to begin at 3 p.m. on Friday.
